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Air Intake Filtration for Cooling Towers

Willow Creek Community Church’s congregation joins together for each week at a million square foot
college style campus situated on acres of Illinois farmland. Three cooling towers are utilized to keep the facility cooled as part of their
chilled water loop air conditioning system. As water in the cooling tower
trickles down through the tower, high volumes of air blow across it, and airborne
debris that gets mixed in with the water, ends up in the
cooling tower basin.

Willow Creek Community Church’s congregation of 24,000
joins together for their spiritual journey each week at a million square foot
college style campus situated on 155 acres of Illinois farmland. The latest
facility addition included a $73 million, four level, 7,200-seat auditorium
used for services, full production musicals, multimedia presentations and
lectures.

Three cooling towers are utilized to keep the facility cooled as part of their
chilled water loop air conditioning system. As water in the cooling tower
trickles down through the tower, high volumes of air blow across it. Airborne
debris that gets mixed in with the water, like cottonwood, end up in the
cooling tower basin. The cooled water in the basin is piped into the building
and runs through a strainer to clean these contaminants out. During cottonwood
season, they needed to remove and wash the clogged strainer two times a day.
Solid contaminants sucked into cooling towers can also deposit on heat transfer
surfaces, increasing fouling factors and energy consumption. These contaminants
also clog the small spray nozzle orifices and cause poor distribution through
the fill.

Two custom sized PreVent filters from Permatron Corp., Elk Grove Village, Ill.,
made of flexible black high abrasion media were easily installed on the primary
Marley NC Class 650 ton cooling tower in the spring. The filters caught the
cottonwood before it entered the system. Based on the water pressure gauges on
each side of the strainer, the strainer only needed to be rinsed clean once
every four days instead of two times per day, with the PreVent filters
installed on the tower air intake. The strainer was 90 percent cleaner.

Routine cleaning of the PreVent filter face will be done when each system
cycles off, since they rotate between three cooling tower units, depending on
heat load. Annual cooling tower cleaning also includes manual cleaning of the
water basin, and mandatory equipment shut-down for the duration of the cleaning
1 time per year. Contaminants left in the basin promote bacteria and algae
growth, increasing the need for chemical treatments, which ultimately reduce
the basin life. Basin cleaning is also simpler with the PreVent filter because
the messy solid contaminants were kept out of the system to begin with.

For more information on how equipment protection filters can simplify your
maintenance routine and keep equipment running at optimal efficiencies, contact
Permatron Corp. at (800) 882-8012 or visit www.permatron.com.